The Atos IT Challenge 2020 was held this year on the theme of “Cooperative Artificial Intelligence”. Teams from 27 countries competed in this international student competition and the winners were announced.

After an initial pre-selection of 16 application projects, including GyroThreat from CentraleSupélec, the Atos IT Challenge jury, made up of experts and Atos managers, has selected three finalists, whose final ranking is as follows:

▪ 1st prize and winner of the IT Challenge: Asia Pacific University, Malaysia

“PestKillerBot” is an innovative application that aims to eliminate pests in flower crops by means of drones that fly over the plots autonomously to detect and eventually eliminate diseases or insect pests.

The architecture of the solution is divided into four parts: area allocation, route planning and location, interference detection and UAV activation simulation allowing users to visualize the field coverage by each craft. Students at the University of Asia Pacific have already developed a highly sophisticated UAV prototype with a 3D printer.

The team wins €10,000 and each student is offered the opportunity to do an internship or first collaboration at Atos.

▪ 2nd prize: Instituto Tecnologico de Estudios Superiores Monterrey (Technological Institute of Higher Studies Monterrey), Mexico

“Digital Water: Artificial Intelligence at home” is a web application for water consumers and water companies. In addition to predicting the consumption and water level of three dams, the application provides detailed information so that users can monitor consumption levels, wastage and various potential problems with the aim of improving the general management of water resources, saving energy, avoiding leaks in the network, etc.

The team already has data collected over five years. They developed the functionalities of their solution for four years and tested it for one year.

The team wins €5,000 and each student is offered the opportunity to do an internship or first collaboration at Atos.

▪ 3rd prize: Josip Juraj Strossmayer University in Ostijek, Croatia

“CTC – Cooperative Traffic Control” is an innovative solution to improve traffic. The application simulates traffic light control using Deep Reinforcement Learning. Each junction acts as an ‘agent’ that performs an action, lengthening or reducing the green or red crossing time depending on the number of cars in the lane and the waiting time. The application also obtains information about the nearest junctions. The team has already ‘trained’ the model to get the best possible configuration for traffic light control.

The team wins €3,000 and each student is offered the opportunity to do an internship or first collaboration at Atos.

This year, the jury also awarded a special prize to a contribution that was particularly distinguished, both by the importance of the subject matter and by the team’s involvement.

▪ Special Jury Prize: Loughborough University, United Kingdom

“Initial Survey Swarm” is a maze simulator. The project uses drones that collect a lot of visual information and can share it to search for destroyed buildings by generating a 3D map or a representation of a place after an earthquake, or in case of lack of internet coverage.

At the end of the ceremony, Sophie Proust, Chief Technology Officer of the Atos Group, said :

“Artificial intelligence is revolutionizing all sectors of the economy and society. The students selected for the Atos IT Challenge have demonstrated real entrepreneurial qualities by proposing innovative and concrete solutions that meet the new needs of cooperative artificial intelligence expressed by businesses and individuals. I am impressed by the exceptional creativity and quality of the contributions of our finalists. Congratulations to our winners and to all our participants”.

The theme of the Atos IT Challenge 2021 has also been announced. Next year, students will have the opportunity to develop innovative concepts around the theme of “How digital can help decarbonise the non-digital”.

Since its creation in 2012, the Atos IT Challenge has enabled students from all over the world to develop applications related to the major trends of the digital revolution, such as intelligent mobility, the connected car, interactive media, connected living, the right to forget, blockchain and artificial intelligence. Students are supported by members of the Atos Scientific Community who provide technical and practical support, advice and encouragement.

Translated from Atos IT Challenge 2020 sur l’Intelligence Artificielle Coopérative – découvrez les équipes gagnantes